Friday, July 15, 2016

Nervous Senate Democrats raised concerns with Hillary Clinton during a private meeting in the Capitol Thursday over a recent poll showing Donald Trump leading or tied in several battleground states.

“Some people were freaked out, they were looking down at the polls on Real Clear Politics and asking why it was so close,” said a Democratic senator who attended the meeting, referring to a website lawmakers were checking out on their personal devices.

Clinton’s response? “She said there are other issues. People are unhappy and they don’t trust institutions,” the senator explained.

A second Democratic source in the meeting confirmed there was “a mention of the Florida poll.”

A Quinnipiac University poll released this week showed the presumptive GOP presidential nominee up 42 percent to 39 percent in swing-state Florida. Clinton had an 8-point lead in Quinnipiac’s poll of the state last month.

The same survey showed Trump ahead 2 points in Pennsylvania, another big swing state, and tied in Ohio. The three states have been pivotal in the last four presidential elections.

The source emphasized that no one suggested that Clinton wasn’t running a strong race or questioned her performance.

Instead, it was an acknowledgement that the presidential race will be very close even though many Washington-based strategists and pundits across the ideological spectrum question Trump’s seriousness as a candidate.

“There was concern raised about the race because we know it’s going to be a close race,” said the source.

I've predicted a Trumpslide rather than a close race. The predictions here have varied tremendously, with expert number-cruncher dh seeing an easy Clinton win, and virtually everything else in between.

SciVo: Trump 352

dh: Clinton 307, Trump 231

EscapeVelocity: Trump 270 to 280

What will happen will happen, regardless of what any of us think. But here is my explanation for why the analysis of the usual numbers don't matter. One, it is too early for them to be relevant. At this stage, Leave was far behind Remain in the #Brexit referendum. At this stage, Dukakis was 17 points ahead of Bush. So, the number crunchers will almost surely change their tune as the numbers change.

Two, the candidates' actions and world events will affect the numbers. Both these trends favor Trump. What is Hillary going to do to Trump that will reduce his appeal, versus what Trump is going to do to her? And what events are going to take place around the world that will enhance Hillary's appeal versus Trump's, especially when Hillary is going around saying things like this as entire families are being wiped out in France by Muslims.

All Trump has to do is relentlessly quote Hillary on about a dozen different subjects and he'll win. As for those who say my political predictions are uniformly bad or that I am out of the US political prediction business, let me point out four things.

I make my predictions very early. I don't wait until it is obvious. Where is the fun in that?

95 Comments:

Even with the usual liberal oversampling to create an atmosphere of defeat in people who will not vote for the Democrat as the leftist press has always done in my lifetime, they still can't create an impression of inevitability for that evil bitch.

Also who gives a crap if you call it properly?! It's fun to speculate!

I think the fact that he's been called racist, xenophobic, hater, idiot, misogynist whatever and still basically ties with her in polls at this early stage (pre-Trump's attack hillary plan) basically suggests a) shes an awful candidate and it looks like a bag of flour with a face drawn on it could beat her, and b) Trump is pretty much about to over take her post Convention.

And what events are going to take place around the world that will enhance Hillary's appeal versus Trump's

I think BLM is going to get violent next week in Cleveland. The media will dutifully redeploy the "Dinnadu's violence is Trumps fault" message. It's not going to work and people are going to lean Trump 55-45 in reaction. Then Philly is going to hit and BLM will be just as violent, if not more so, then. Even the clueless are going to catch on at that point and it will be Trump 62-38.

Dear Hillary, please keep sending out pro-terrorist tweets.Irrelevant that a billion muslims are not terrorists and taking up arms themselves, they are providing blanket cover for the real terrorists to hide and supporting the terrorists in almost every way possible.

I think you are correct it will be a landslide and it has nothing whatsoever to do about the candidates, it is about- as Hillary said- the institutions. Everyone understands deep down that the entire system is corrupt, that the deck is stacked and that the laws are not equally followed or enforced.

The only choice is to pick the candidate who represents a challenge to the institutions.

Period.

It isn't hard to understand unless you don't want to understand and those in positions of power rarely see themselves as powerless.

And they couldn't have picked a worse candidate. Their belief in choosing the apex political predator was exactly the wrong move at this moment in history.

I would love to be wrong, but my prediction is that Hillary will have as much fraud on her behalf done to get her to 300 electoral votes. TPTB just won't let go of their spot at the trough short of at least a 1789 French Revolution. Hope it doesn't take a Russian 1917 one...

None of your past predictions are applicable to this election. This because this election includes the rejection of the republican elite by the republican base. Trump noticed the peasant/torch mob on its way to the GOPe castle, and ran in front. This election is about evening some past scores. Madam Dufarge is checking the knitting.

@13: Pretty much. Although give Trump credit, he's wisely picked positions that more or less align him with a majority of Americans. He's also been lucky when it comes to events and being in a position to show his colors on the issue, such as with the death of Kate Steinle.

Speaking of which, if Trump really wants to grind the Democrats' collective face into their own identity politics bullshit, he needs to make a point of mentioning both Steinle and Jamiel Shaw. Shaw was a black kid who was shot and killed by an 'undocumented immigrant' Hispanic gang member.

I'm not going to get into arguments over whether Shaw was a good kid or a teenage dindu; I don't know where he fell on that scale. As far as I can tell, he got shot because he was wearing red. But Trump can and should use this as a wedge to try and break off chunks of the black vote.

It's a personal identity thing, at least in part. Their elderly whites faction still see the Democratic Party as it was 30-40 years ago when its left wing was labor unions. It's their brand. They don't get that reality has changed around them, that the new and enlarged left wing of their party want to destroy America and the entire rest of Western Civilization. The reality of muslim terrorism may get through to some of them, though. While MSM is doing their level best to spin it, they can't hide it.

The polls are rigged... On an even money bet I would have taken Trump right along. Given the corruption in the system I imagine he will have to pick up a couple of more percent points for a win and it seems likely. Despite his flaws he is enough different from the system that even a narrow victory would count as a blow out win. Love to see it.

"Two, the candidates' actions and world events will affect the numbers. Both these trends favor Trump. What is Hillary going to do to Trump that will reduce his appeal, versus what Trump is going to do to her?...All Trump has to do is relentlessly quote Hillary on about a dozen different subjects and he'll win. "

Precisely. Trump has already established his aura and draw as a an anti-PC, anti-establishment, maverick. While the advice he's been given by cucks since late last year to 'tone it down' or 'appear presidential' would have seen him weakened I think it's fairly solid advice now that he's the GOP nominee.

All he needs to do is appear competent and calm while Hillary inevitably muck-rakes and loses her shit, BLM etc continue to cause havoc stateside and attack his supporters, and the Muslims worldwide continue to do their thing and show again and again how right he is and how demented Clinton is.

Of course in the debates I'd expect him to (And he should) go in swinging but either side of them play it cool and let the Dems put themselves into meltdown.

Yep, and according to Zerohedge, Bernie betrayal is setting in. The Green party candidate Jill Stein has had a %1000 jump in donations. I think a lot of Bernie supporters will sit out, or protest vote for someone else. That too will sink the Magic Carpet Eater.

And what events are going to take place around the world that will enhance Hillary's appeal versus Trump's, especially when Hillary is going around saying things like this as entire families are being wiped out in France by Muslims.

Clinton called into FOX and CNN last night to try to staunch her bleeding. When Anderson Fucking Cooper, for God's sake, cornered her about Syrian "refugee" resettlement here, Clinton equivocated.

BLM and Muslims being Muslims are taking her out of the race, but not at as fast a rate as Hillary is taking herself out of the race.

"Washington-based strategists and pundits across the ideological spectrum question Trump’s seriousness as a candidate."

LOL, So how's that been going guys?

He'll never run for President. XHe'll never get over 2%. XHe'll never submit his finances. XHe'll never get over 5%. XHe'll never win a debate. XHe'll never win in the East. XHe'll never get over 10%. XHe'll never win a delegate. XHe'll never win in the South. XHe'll never beat Christie. XHe'll never get over 20%. XHe'll never get over 100 delegates. XHe'll never win Evangelicals. XHe'll never get endorsed. XHe'll never win a Caucus. XHe'll never win in the North. XHe'll never beat Carson. XHe'll never get over 30%. XHe'll never get over 200 delegates. XHe'll never win with Latinos. XHe'll never win a Primary. XHe'll never win in the West. XHe'll never beat Kasich. XHe'll never get over 40%. XHe'll never get over 400 delegates. XHe'll never win with women. XHe'll never win 8 States. XHe'll never beat Jeb. XHe'll never get over 50%. XHe'll never get over 600 delegates. XHe'll never beat Rubio. XHe'll never get over 60%. XHe'll never get over 1000 delegates. XHe'll never beat Cruz. XHe'll never get the CandidacyXHe'll never beat Hillary.He'll never build the wall.He'll never win a second term.He'll never Make America Great Again.

Some people have this weird belief that explaining why something is true makes it not true.

"Gosh Hillary, for an inevitable anointed queen, you seem to be doing poorly. Should we be concerned?"

"No, it's just that this is an antiestablishment election, I'm not very charismatic, and I have a consistent pattern that the more the electorate learns about me, the less they like me. That's all this poll drop is. So everything's obviously fine, don't worry."

Once you start looking for this argument technique, you'll be surprised how often you see it. I cannot even remotely wrap my brain around the mindset that thinks this is a solid argument technique. It's like some even-more pathological version of rationalization, where instead of deliberately seeking out reasons why you are correct and ignoring the reasons why you are wrong, you just... seek out reasons, and start just saying words, and don't even think about whether they support your desired belief or not.

pdwalker wrote:Good heavens. Is Hillary really that arrogant and stupid to think that people will actually believe what she says?

Please tell me that people really aren't that stupid.

My FIL is a part of that older white demographic, and while he does espouse some non-leftist points (anti-union, anti-immigrant), he still insists on dumbing himself down with the nightly MSM newscasts. He's so ingrained on a number of BS points that even his siblings, who are like minded but a little wiser (one has openly admitted to abhoring the idea of Clinton as the D candidate), have started to call him out on it. It's embarrassing.

There's a secret weapon here that only Trump can use, and it can neuter Hillary's fraud machine:

Third-party poll watchers in Dem precincts.

The anti-anti-fraud consent decree only binds the GOPe. It has nothing to do with Natural Law, Green, Libertarian or anyone else. Any or all of THOSE parties could send poll-watchers to BOLO for illegal voters, count voters, do exit polling and everything else. Anyone with some money could help train up those watchers to keep things (relatively) clean.

krymneth wrote:It's like some even-more pathological version of rationalization, where instead of deliberately seeking out reasons why you are correct and ignoring the reasons why you are wrong, you just... seek out reasons, and start just saying words, and don't even think about whether they support your desired belief or not.

It's a viable rhetorical technique because a significant fraction of people won't actually assess the reason. See Influence by Dr. Cialdini, the photocopier test, where the experimenter was often able to cut in line by giving the reason "I need to make some copies" -- even though everyone else was in line for the same reason.

Scott Adams pays homage to that phenomenon with a different nonsense plug at the end of every blog post, such as "If you didn't think that made sense, you might like my book. It's rectangular."

Still plenty of faggots that have no problem with her taking $40 million from nations that execute gays while secretary.

Good heavens. Is Hillary really that arrogant and stupid to think that people will actually believe what she says?

She has the dead vote locked in, and thinks that 8000 bussed in groids will ruin the RNC. She doesn't realize that seeing bikers reenact One Golden Dawn vs 30 Antifa will make everyone want to be on golden dawns side. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfUolJ3MVpI

Then Philly is going to hit and BLM will be just as violent, if not more so, then.

No schadenfreude is as good as seeing a white college professor with a BLM shirt on soaked in his own blood from his pet groids. "But But I had a BLM shirt on I guess BGKB was right about blacks functional literacy"

Trump noticed the peasant/torch mob on its way to the GOPe castle, and ran in front.

He saw them heading with pitchforks in the late afternoon and sold them torches for when it got dark.

mentioning both Steinle and Jamiel Shaw. Shaw was a black kid who was shot and killed by an 'undocumented immigrant' Hispanic

Almost all of the blacks he has had on stage have been people who have lost family members to illegal aliens.

Speaking of Democrats, is everyone ready for the Great American Chimp-Out of 2016 being held today?

Not going anywhere near it but did warn people. I hope they burn all the democrat voting locations down in the leftist cities holding it.

The Hillary/Democrat strategy requires dividing the world into victim groups, then pandering to them. The problem during this election cycle is that most of the victim groups--Muslims, BLM, Feminists, and Hispanic activists, are downright despicable. So in aligning herself with them, she naturally alienates the rest of us. The divide and conquer strategy only works when the various groups are seen mostly benignly. That's no longer the case. We now see them for what they are: Forces of anti-civilizational evil.

He saw them heading with pitchforks in the late afternoon and sold them torches for when it got dark.Pretty damn good torches too. Only the finest quality. High energy. Ought to last at least until 2020.

Something I mentioned in another thread still holds. The pattern for the pollsters (just another form of gangster) is to use the polls for propaganda as long as possible, and then show the race as "competitive" at the last moment to preserve their credibility.

That they are shifting to "competitive" this early means Hillary has no chance. Their numbers show that she is going to lose so decisively that anyone who has been predicting her win anytime after now is going to be ruined.

This is pure self-preservation by the pollsters, because they know how bad it is going to be. Compare this to Brexit, where they knew it would be close, but they hid those polls until literally two days before the vote.

54. Blogger clk July 15, 2016 11:31 AM The old episode of South Park where the choice is between a "shit sandwich" and "a douche" appears to be informative to this election... A country of >300M and these are our best and only choices ?

who would you like to be able to vote for?

seems like Trump might actually stop the invasion of illegals, which is something nobody has really been interested in doing since Ike.

Gas prices were soaring, and inflation was rampant. More than four dozen Americans who had been kidnapped from the U.S. Embassy in Iran were being held hostage while, according to Trump, "we just sit back and take everybody's abuse. . . . I just don't feel the country is going forward in the proper direction."

Many polls say different things but what I find interesting isn't even Trump leading in PA according to Quinnipiac(!), but that in one month in Florida Q-pac went from Clinton +8 to Trump +3. That's crazy.

I am skeptical of the PA numbers and there seems to be plenty of room for Hillary to make up if she can get the Bernie folks on her side, but Quinnipiac was accurate for 2012 in PA. Even Democrat Nate Silver rates them as A -.

Hillary can still take comfort in the national polls, but if she's trailing in PA this early on she is definitely worried.

VD, if you ever feel inclined to elaborate on your "Trumpslide" prediction with the numbers (vote share/turnout) you expect for different demographic breakdowns, I think we would all be very interested. You have a way of being prescient, and if your unorthodox prediction turns out to be correct it would be interesting to see what considerations led you to it.

Instead, it was an acknowledgement that the presidential race will be very close even though many Washington-based strategists and pundits across the ideological spectrum question Trump’s seriousness as a candidate"

Please note that the first half of this sentence directly contradicts the second. As if a man being eaten by a shark, both legs gone, were still to pause and wonder whether the shark were seriously hungry.

They're not. Hillary voters know she lies and just do not give a tinker's damn. They don't like her. But they hate you, hate Trump, hate the patriarchy, hate whitey, hate the capitalist, hate the police, hate motherhood, hate the rich, hate the heterosexuals, hate guns, hate free speech, hate, hate, hate Christ and His followers most of all.

election cycle is that most of the victim groups--Muslims, BLM, Feminists, and Hispanic activists, are downright despicable.

The problem is they can't separate their messages. A week before the 2012 election Bath House Barry Obama told black clergy he would prevent gay marriage. No coverage in gay media and those I showed the video to just thought he was pulling one over on "stupid Christians", "don't you mean stupid black Christians?"= dirty look. They succeeded before by telling each victim category its own bedtime fairy tale.

I have searched high and low for a definitive number of Black voters in the US and cannot find an answer. They repeatedly claim that 62% of "eligible" black voters came out in 2012 (to vote for a black) but once you remove the unregistered, the under 18 and the felons, what's the number? I doubt it's 3% of the population- tops.

So how much bearing could they possibly have and why the incessant pandering for such a small number?

@70, Black voters don't matter for their numbers. They matter because getting 90% of the black vote has given Democrats a sense of moral superiority (strongly bolstered by the media) going back for decades. They see it as prima facie evidence that they are on the right side of every issue, and that Republicans are evil racists by definition. They will fight to keep that moral high ground, even if it costs them more total voters than it gains.

On the Republican side, there's a similar effect in reverse: many Republicans (cuckservatives) crave a piece of that black vote to prove that they aren't racist (anymore). So they too will pander for it, not caring whether it costs them more white votes than it could gain from blacks. In fact, they see their willingness to sacrifice white votes as a virtue in itself, because it proves just how much they care about not being racist.

I just read few articles describing US elections and it just came to me: the quip describing communist elites, which is now also employed to described compradorian "elites" in my country, is ideally suited also to your elites:

Idiocracy is certainly affecting the United States, but something tells me that it's hitting the left half of the country far harder than the right half. If this keeps up, in fifty years, the Left will be a bunch of drooling morons.

The Clintons are one-trick ponies, all they know is digging up dirt and smearing. They already tried that with Trump and its not working. But theres a LOT more dirt on the Clintons that hasnt come out.

Nope, for the first time in some time, politically, I agree with your assessment. Though I have for a while. Some time back I posted that it was Trump's job, the presidency, if he wanted it. Before it was cool, before he got all the numbers technically needed, before terrorism reared it's beautiful head again and again. Love it when a plan backfires in the right direction.

VFM #7634 wrote:Idiocracy is certainly affecting the United States, but something tells me that it's hitting the left half of the country far harder than the right half. If this keeps up, in fifty years, the Left will be a bunch of drooling morons.

SciVo wrote:It's a viable rhetorical technique because a significant fraction of people won't actually assess the reason. See Influence by Dr. Cialdini, the photocopier test, where the experimenter was often able to cut in line by giving the reason "I need to make some copies" -- even though everyone else was in line for the same reason.

Scott Adams pays homage to that phenomenon with a different nonsense plug at the end of every blog post, such as "If you didn't think that made sense, you might like my book. It's rectangular."

I predict that Trump will have an "accident" or maybe decide to commit suicide by cutting off his own head then neatly disposing of it in a trash can some 30 yards away. An Arkansas autopsy will confirm Trump's tragic suicide and a neatly typed letter will be found with his head saying he felt guilt at his non-pc ways. His VP will quietly leave the scene (he'd damn well BETTER) and ¡JEB! will rise from the ashes to run against her. Hillary will win by securing 12% of the popular vote (88% will stay home cleaning their guns) and she'll say the people have spoken! During her swearing in ceremony her body will split open to reveal a giant tarantula to the surprise of no one.

Phelps wrote:That they are shifting to "competitive" this early means Hillary has no chance. Their numbers show that she is going to lose so decisively that anyone who has been predicting her win anytime after now is going to be ruined.

Yes, to the first part, no to the second. There must be another reason why they're doing it now, since they still have plenty of time to move gradually and play it off as a shift in sentiment.

Consider how market analysts are always, always, always able to come up with some plausible-sounding after-the-fact explanation for a price going up, down, or sideways, even though a monkey flinging poo at a chart on a wall would do as well or better at prediction.

I can guarantee that on November 9, regardless of the outcome, whatever the explanations given by the mobile good-hair support systems on TV, we can play a thought-experiment of "what if the outcome were opposite?" and I will be able to give you reasons that sound just as good or better.

So, I see two possibilities: those pollsters are just doing honest measurement, not even trying to persuade anyone; or they're trying to influence one or both nominating conventions, since neither candidate is actually official yet.

@3They're not. Hillary voters know she lies and just do not give a tinker's damn. They don't like her. But they hate you, hate Trump, hate the patriarchy, hate whitey, hate the capitalist, hate the police, hate motherhood, hate the rich, hate the heterosexuals, hate guns, hate free speech, hate, hate, hate Christ and His followers most of all.

They will vote for her as a drowning man would vote for air.

Can't say I've seen all of those, but I've seen hate of Patriarchy (feminist), Trump, Palin, Southerner's, and contempt for Americans, as well as Brexit voters (the latter two in a "What's the Matter With Kansas" manner) in person, rolled into one.

The polls are rigged... On an even money bet I would have taken Trump right along. Given the corruption in the system I imagine he will have to pick up a couple of more percent points for a win and it seems likely.

I mean this is where it gets really sloppy around here. Which polls are rigged? All of them? From all sources? Except for the 3 or 4 that show Trump narrowing the lead?

Vox, about your Trumpslide prediction. The mainstream media say Clinton's already taken her worst damage (over the emails), but the revelations over Trump University are yet to come. How does that fit with your prediction?

The mainstream media say Clinton's already taken her worst damage (over the emails), but the revelations over Trump University are yet to come.

It's wishful thinking. Trump has already been running against the media and half of his own party. If there were major revelations to come from that, they would have been used to keep him from the nomination. And no, the theories that he's being set up to run because he's especially vulnerable might make a cute movie script, but it doesn't work that way.

That's not to say the Democrats won't try to make hay from Trump U.; of course they'll try to use that and whatever else they can come up with. But it's mostly old news now, so people who already weren't voting for him will get freshly incensed, and everyone else will zone out.

Scandal just isn't the barrier to winning that it used to be -- thanks in large part to the Clintons and their media friends. I remember how frustrating it was, as a conservative in the early 1990s, telling people about the Rose Law Firm, cattle futures, Hubbell's cocaine trips, and on and on, and watching their eyes glaze over. Trump will be even harder to attack with scandal, because people already think of him as a rogue from years of seeing him in the tabloids. It's already baked into his numbers.

Post a Comment

Rules of the blogPlease do not comment as "Anonymous". Comments by "Anonymous" will be spammed.